We postponed the session planned for today (8th May) in order to concentrate on the methods of educational enquiry with Lisa, Mel, Ed. and and Jes. I've left the details of the planned session below with the intention of returning to them when it is more appropriate.

Lisa gave me an almost finished draft of her educational enquiry to respond to. Jes and Lisa are responding to each others' enquiries for prepare for their final submissions. I said that I would see if I could just help to strengthen the contents of these first enquiries by focusing on some literature about teacher-researcher. I've done this and you should be able to read my responses and access the papers by clicking here.

Details of Postponed contents from the 8th May meeting.

What I'd like to do on the 8th May is to visit the Brislington Training School Website at

http://pathways2002.uwe.ac.uk/trainingschool/

and to look at some of the updates on

http://www.actionresearch.net

So I'm hoping that Gordon can organise a live connection to the internet with a video-projector facility.

What I said that I would do at our session on the 8th May is to review the educational enquiries I've read in terms of four of the five standards of judgement used to assess the masters units:

i) Made critical use of literature, professional experience and, where appropriate, knowledge from other sources, to inform the focus and methodology of the study or enquiry.

ii) Made appropriate critical use of the literature and, where appropriate, knowledge from other sources, in the development of the study or enquiry and its conclusions.

iii) Demonstrated an ability to identify and categorise issues, and to undertake an educational study or enquiry in an appropriately critical, original, and balanced fashion.

iv) Demonstrated an ability to analyse, interpret and critique findings and arguments and, where appropriate, to apply these in a reflective manner to the improvement of educational practices.

The Westwood Group have asked me to write an introduction to a collection of their writings. I'm hoping to have this done by next week.

After I have gone through the nature of the assignment for the Methods of Educational Enquiry unit, if we have time I'd like to share the introduction with you. Here is what I've just written to the Westwood and I'm hoping that you will see its significance for your enquiries:

"What I'm hoping the introduction to your collection of writings will provide is a better understanding of the connection I'm making between your educational enquiries and those that I see going on in a range of national and international contexts that include the British Educational Research Association and the American Educational Research Association. In particular I'll relate your enquiries to those in the self-study of teacher education practices (S-STEP) of AERA and to ideas in Educational Researcher, a publication of AERA."